


some other time, perhaps, if you so wish

by Ser_Renity



Category: Bleach
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, F/F, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Trans Female Character, and yoruichi is respected, as in: urahara was not a disgusting piece of shit in this
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-16
Updated: 2016-07-16
Packaged: 2018-07-24 08:29:23
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,256
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7501206
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ser_Renity/pseuds/Ser_Renity
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Yoruichi is a person, too.</p>
            </blockquote>





	some other time, perhaps, if you so wish

**Author's Note:**

> I hope I was respectful with this, please correct me if I wasn't.
> 
> Honestly, what I wanted to do here was just allow Yoruichi to relax and unwind for once and have weaknesses too instead of having to fit into that "strong woman!!!" stereotype that is just "woman who punches stuff".  
> Also in this version and in my stuff in general that last horrible form of hers will be ignored because that fetish stuff was pretty disgusting so yeaaaahhh

 

* * *

 

 

Yoruichi was tired and she felt it in every muscle, every bone.

  
Sometimes she joked about her age, calling the exhaustion a symptom of growing old. As if it mattered to her kind at this point, as if she had not had worse things to deal with.

  
Yoruichi felt like she was born for battle, as if this urge to get more powerful and faster, only ever faster, was part of her genetic code. Hardwired into her brain, a benign mass of cells so tightly knitted into the flesh that she could not get rid of it.

  
From the beginning she had been told she was destined for greatness- and she was, oh, she knew that just as well as all those people who hit the dust in front of her in combat. She would challenge them all, defeat them all. Soul Society had known that and so had Kisuke. They were friends then and friends now because he respected her and her choices, even if they contradicted what he had planned.

  
But still, Yoruichi had never been the planner, the mastermind behind it all. She knew what she wanted and where she needed to be to achieve it but she followed orders, too- the weapon of mass destruction rather than the one who fired it.

  
Among all of that and the wars that required her to fight it was easy to lose oneself in blood and dirt and the sweat dripping down her back as she brought down an empire.

  
So now that it was all over she wanted something for herself. If it was only a short moment of respite that was okay with her- just long enough to remember who she was and force her soul back into her weapon of a body. Some enemies made comments about it; sneered or looked down on her until she ground them into the earth underneath her heel.

  
Yoruichi didn’t always feel like a woman during the war; hell, she had trouble being a person when the kick of her thunder god form hit. When the electricity ran through her, a true live current from the sole of her boots to the tips of her fingers, then she felt ethereal, larger than life. If she was an abstract concept then she would be _power_ itself.

  
Soifon admired that about her- but sometimes, just once in a while, Yoruichi didn’t want to be the god of thunder or the strongest war potential.

  
This was one of those times.

  
She hummed a quiet song as she listened to the water slowly filling up the tub, a tune that had gotten stuck in her head ever since she returned to the human world.

  
The ritual needed to be slow, controlled, gentle. If she just hurried this it would not work as well.

  
Yoruichi rubbed her arms slowly, soothing the cool skin. Then she reached up, unzipped her clothes and let them fall to the floor. She had never had a problem with nudity. Now she was alone and the steam of the bath warmed up the room- she felt good.

Almost like herself.

  
She dipped her toe into the bath and watched the way the water rippled and sloshed around her foot, then her ankle, then the inside of her knee.

  
Yoruichi loved warmer weather, the summer months, the sun making her skin prickle. This seemed even better now- outside it was chilly, in here she could let the water warm her up from the inside.

  
She fully stepped into the bathtub in one fluent motion. Its wooden framework felt good against her rough palms as she slowly lowered herself down into the water.

  
Yoruichi took a deep breath, let the grin on her face spread from ear to ear before it softened. The song on her mind continued and she reached up to untie the ribbon that held up her hair. After all that happened the strands were tangled and dry as she ran her fingers through them, smoothed them out for now. One thing at a time; slowly, carefully now.

  
Rushing this would not allow her to cherish it; there was a huge difference between this and the quick satisfaction of a fight.

  
So she moved her hands languidly underneath the surface and let her fingers part the water as if she was a deity in the flesh. It all just felt good, clean, like some semblance of normality that she had never cared to get accustomed to.

  
Yoruichi loved this, every indulgent second of it.

  
Nudity was a part of it and she felt anything but exposed with no eyes on her. She remembered what it had been like to undress in front of Soifon before, showing off her body. It took a lot of focus not to shout “Surprise!” as her girlfriend saw the penis between her legs, her eyes widening in recognition. It would have been funny, kind of.

  
Yoruichi could be nervous too, afraid and anxious. Soifon’s reaction had been so understanding and caring she felt herself falling into safe stability immediately but that didn’t invalidate her fears. She was a person, just like anyone else out here in this strange world of ghosts and spirits.

  
She ran her fingers through her hair once more, massaged shampoo into the scalp and washed it out just as carefully. The purple strands were soft as she carded through them over and over again, making sure they were okay once more.

  
Anything beyond this was just to please herself.

  
Yoruichi lit the candles at her sides as if this was a ritual to summon a dark goddess. They smelled like vanilla, like all the good things and all those she desired close. It smelled like home, a little, like this world she claimed as hers after her years as an outcast.

  
The sake she had prepared was still hot and fancy enough to prickle down her throat as she drank the first cup all at once. Heat pooled in her stomach and she loved it, the controlled indulgence of it all as her eyes fell shut.

  
_Relax. Relax and don’t worry about fighting._

  
She didn’t have to be anyone or anything else here, she only needed this bath and its warmth, the meaning of her tiny little ritual between conflicts. God, how she loved it- the slow pace and the weight of every movement, her blinking in the middle of it all.

  
Yoruichi hummed again and shoveled the water towards her, let it slosh against her collarbones and sank deeper until her chin was almost submerged.

  
This was just for herself- because she earned it, because she deserved so much more than her thoughts were willing to grant her sometimes.

  
A weapon, on some days. A woman, on others.

  
She was both- she was more complicated than a word or two, more than a total accumulation of extremes.

  
Yoruichi thought of Orihime, then, suddenly, of Nel and Soifon and Hinamori and Matsumoto and all those girls she wanted to protect from the world. Soon. Her responsibilities would catch up her with soon enough.

  
For now, though, it was just her and the warmth, the feeling of water against her aching skin.

  
In this moment, Yoruichi was okay. She chased after it with ambition, craved it even with the thrill of fighting in her heart.

  
She loved it, loved it all, being a conundrum, keeping them guessing.

  
Yoruichi hummed her song again, loud and happy. It wasn’t yet time to leave.

  
One warm moment left; another.

  
Soon.

 

* * *

 


End file.
